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Elementary School Teacher Battling Rare Form of Cancer

Publication: WOAI-TV (NBC, San Antonio)
01/12/2019

A local teacher is battling a cancer not usually found in someone her age.

Victoria Flores is doing anything she can to get help fighting a rare form of cancer. Doctors diagnosed her with bile duct cancer. Typically found in elderly men.

Flores is 31-years-old now, fighting for her life.

"It was a waiting game for about four days before they found out exactly what it was," Flores said.

Instead of a classroom, now-a-days Victoria Flores finds herself in a hospital bed.

"It's treatable but not curable," Flores said.

Flores said the radiologist said it was the biggest mass he had ever seen. The third grade teacher at Brauchle elementary first thought it was a stomach bug. But doctors told her it was bile duct cancer.

"It's not very common diagnosis and to have it in such a young person is a rather unusual presentation," Dr. Sridhar Beeram said.

Beeram said Flores's case is extremely rare.

"Seeing how my wife fights day in and day out, her message to cancer is: "you picked the wrong person," Hector Flores said.

There is one thing she thinks of when she's here.

"Just not being with my little boy," Flores said.

Her baby Mateo. Bound by chemotherapy, Flores missed her son's first birthday.

"It's hard to be gone from him," Flores said.

Her family is what keeps her going.

"I couldn't be more proud of my wife," Hector said.

Five weeks of chemo down.

"She's fighting for Mateo," Danny Bruen, Victoria's father said. "She's fighting for Hector."

It's a tough road ahead.

"Some days are pretty bad," Flores said.

Which is why she is asking for your help.

"We are really just asking for prayers," Flores said.

If you would like to help you can help Victoria with medical bills.

Click here to watch the full story.

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